


Snippet of a Mikey fic

by fictionalaspect



Series: Unfinished, Abandoned, Snippets, Bits and Pieces [5]
Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Character Study, Gen, Gen Fic, JERSEY WHAT WHAT
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-16
Updated: 2012-01-16
Packaged: 2017-10-29 15:25:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/321355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fictionalaspect/pseuds/fictionalaspect
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If there is a zombie apocalypse, Mikey is absolutely certain that he will be driving through the Meadowlands when it happens. He totally has his knife in his backpack <i>right now.</i> Just in case.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snippet of a Mikey fic

**Author's Note:**

> I have a lot of feelings about New York City and New Jersey, and the connection of MCR fandom to those two places that I love desperately was one of the first things that got me into bandom. This was originally going to be a Pete/Mikey dirty bike messengers AU, but it never quite got off the ground and then I lost most of it in a hard drive crash. This is the only scene I managed to save.

This is the routine on some Sunday afternoons:

Mikey Way takes the bus from Belleville to Washington Park, walking quickly onto the broken down NJ Transit POS they always use for these routes and shoving his headphones into his ears, head down, face closed. Their last conversation plays in his head as his mother waves from the car ( _Tell Gerard to call his mother. Mikey, honestly. Is he okay?He's fine, Mom. Mikey—Mom, he's fine.)_ and he picks something suitably tuneless on his iPod to while away the trip to the next station. At Washington Park he gets on the 108 express by way of Newark and then he stares out the window, letting the Meadowlands wave by, that great expanse of swamp and concrete. He vaguely remembers something from history class about the Meadowlands being created by New York City's landfills? Or something. Now it's just waving strands of cattails and strange hunks of rusting metal in the distance, boxy concrete warehouses full of smuggled goods as the bus rattles and creaks down Rt. 280. If there is a zombie apocalypse, Mikey is absolutely certain that he will be driving through the Meadowlands when it happens. He totally has his knife in his backpack _right now._ Just in case.

After Newark it's the complicated stretch of the New Jersey Turnpike to Route 3 to Route 495 and Mikey doesn't think about much of anything, just pulls his hoodie up over his head, because it's always fucking cold on these buses, and stares aimlessly out into the night and wonders if Gerard actually got it together enough to have dinner waiting—or something resembling dinner—or if he should grab something on the way. He could try calling but Gerard won't answer if he is working on art, or sleeping, or drinking, so that is approximately 99.9% of the time. Mikey decides to just leave it and fingers the crumpled dollar bills in his black jeans, instead. Subway fare from his mom. The luxury of sitting on the J Train while it speeds over the Brooklyn bridge, not pedaling over it, seems slightly unreal in the fading light. He's grateful, though, because he didn't bring his bike to Jersey—too complicated, and he's not enough of a martyr to actually try to *bike* to Belleville—so if she hadn't slipped him some cash he would have had to spring for it anyway.

The bus dips down into the Lincoln tunnel and Mikey's breathing changes—stuttery, arythmic. He always has trouble with this part—he's not claustrophobic but they are driving under rock and sand and oh, _one million tons of water._ It's not the kind of thing that makes you feel safe, if you actually think about it. It's more of a _JesusChristpleasedon'tletthedriverfuckup_ moment. There's also the fact that an accident in the Holland tunnel would snarl up Manhattan traffic for a good five hours, and that's a pain in the ass.

But traffic is moving quickly tonight and there's a whoosh and they're up above the West Side Highway and the city is spread out below them for a second and just for a second Mikey's chest fucking _hurts_ because it's so beautiful there's no other response but to breathe in. Driving in the city is still not something he's used to but unlike his bike, where he's down in the smoke and the dirty and streets, this is removed from the crowd. It's him and this glass pane he's pressing his glasses up against and it's the only time New York seems like it has any fucking idea what it's doing, when you see it from the highway spread out like glistening dew on anthills, piles of humans on top of one another, living and fighting and fucking and wanting to get out but never wanting to leave.

It's over in split second, suddenly, and the bus pulls into Port Authority and Mikey gets off, a too-tall kid in glasses and tight jeans, too skinny by half and probably too dirty as well. He showered this morning in the blue and yellow bathroom of his childhood but he's not sure his clothes have been washed in the last month or so. They're black. He can't really tell.

Back underground—herds of people, the subway, the thick electrical heat of the trains—until he isn't, until they are crossing over to Brooklyn and the stations get dirtier and the pre-teen kids get noisier and some old man is brown-bagging a Colt 45 and his spine relaxes a bit, Mikey stretches his legs out because even if this isn't where he intended to end up, it's good for now. This is familiar. It might be home


End file.
